Nightingale has been a professional comic since 2004.[3][4] He performed his first UK and Ireland tour in 2022 titled Smasher,[5] and subsequently released the show onto YouTube. Nightingale went on his second tour, in 2023 which was titled 'Dan Nightingale's Special' and released the video version on YouTube in January 2024.[6][7]
In 2013 Nightingale was voted Preston's the 'Entertainer of the Year'.[9]
Dan Nightingale has also appeared at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival multiple times. His debut was in 2005 where he appeared with Josie Long in a show titled 'Audience with Josie Long and Dan Nightingale'.[10] Nightingale's second show, in 2008 was named 'Geronimo' where he was noted for his budding 'star quality'.[11] Nightingale returned to the fringe festival in 2012 with 'The Eleven and a Half Ill Conceived Edinburgh Shows of Dan Nightingale'.[12] In 2013 Nightingale's show was titled 'Love in the time of Cholesterol' and his performances were described as 'comforting'.[13]
In his fifth year attending the Edinburgh Fringe Nightingale performed the show 'Dan Nightingale is Trying His Best Not to Be a Dick'. Chortle described this show as 'outrageously funny'.[14] His most recent show was 'Sex, Drugs and My Nanna's Bungalow' in 2018 which garnered positive reviews.[15]
Have A Word Podcast
Nightingale founded the Have a Word podcast with fellow comedian Adam Rowe in 2020.
In 2021, Rowe and Nightingale, under the umbrella of Have A Word, released the song Laura's Gone in a bid to reach Christmas number 1 and raise money for Zoe's Place Baby Hospice and the Childhood Eye Cancer Trust.[16] The song reached number 39 in the Official Charts Company midweek chart.[17]